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8 décembre 2008

Hier Juan m'a copié une trentaine (?) de chinese songs

sur mon mp3 (en fait qu'elle m'a prêté), c'est un moyen pour perfectionné son mandarin... Il y a aussi du cantonais, pas de japonais... Je traduis la première chanson!*

EDITORIAL: Setting a poor precedent

Monday, Dec 08, 2008,  Page 8

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said last week that the Dalai Lama would not be welcome to visit Taiwan anytime soon. The Presidential Office said such a visit, given the current state of cross-strait affairs, would undo its efforts, and that Ma’s decision was based on national interest. This view ignores the existence of Taiwan and only takes aim at short-term benefits.

Since the question was hypothetical — the Dalai Lama hasn’t applied for permission to visit — Ma could have avoided controversy by simply pointing this out. Instead, he chose to say the Tibetan spiritual leader would not be welcome. His statement was clearly aimed at currying favor with China. Even if such a visit had been in the cards, Ma could have stressed that it was purely for religious reasons, and that he would not meet the monk. Instead, Ma caved in completely.

China sees the Dalai Lama as the leader of the Tibetan independence movement. His every move is followed by Chinese protests and suppression. In advance of his meeting on Saturday with French President Nicolas Sarkozy — who currently holds the rotating EU presidency — Beijing tried to intimidate Sarkozy by postponing a planned EU-China summit. The US, Germany and Canada have received similar treatment as a result of the Dalai Lama’s visits, but the leaders of these democracies have insisted on allowing him to visit and meeting with him. They do so out of concern for Tibetan human rights, democracy and religious freedom and because the Dalai Lama insists on achieving Tibetan autonomy through peaceful means.

The cross-strait relationship is indeed important to Taiwan and we all hope the two sides will be able to coexist peacefully. The cross-strait relationship, however, is not the same as the national interest — a free economy, democracy, human rights and national dignity are more important. Because the two sides of the Taiwan Strait have divergent views of these supposedly universal values, it makes no sense to sacrifice Taiwan’s longstanding pursuit of these values for the sake of cross-strait relations.

Ma’s public rejection of a visit by the Dalai Lama will have far reaching consequences. Taiwan will now be seen as working together with China to intimidate the Dalai Lama. Taiwan has long claimed to be a representative of democracy, freedom and human rights in the face of bullying and intimidation by China. Most countries may have sacrificed Taiwan because of Chinese pressures and their own national interests, but they remain sympathetic to Taiwan.

Ma has shot Taiwan in the foot: If Taiwan can’t resist Chinese pressure, then how could we ask for international support?

Taiwanese democracy and human rights have deteriorated since Ma became president. Currying favor with a neighbor that has more than 1,000 missiles aimed at Taiwan and treating the cross-strait relationship as the only national interest is tantamount to bowing to brute force by refusing to allow a visit by an international symbol of human rights, religious freedom and democracy.

Ma has seriously damaged Taiwan, but there may still be a solution. Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) has suggested that religious organizations invite the Dalai Lama to visit as a religious leader, as was the case before. This could be the way to save Taiwan’s international image.
        This story has been viewed 671 times.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2008/05/20/2003430627

(Tue, May 20, 2008!?)/     Monday, Dec 08, 2008,  Page 8       [Un certain bug...]

•China condemns Sarkozy’s meeting with Dalai Lama

AGENCIES, GDANSK, POLAND AND BEIJING             Monday, Dec 08, 2008

French President Nicolas Sarkozy defied China on Saturday by meeting the Dalai Lama and said Europe shared the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader’s concerns over the situation in his homeland.

China called the meeting an “opportunistic, rash and short-sighted approach to handling the Tibet issue,” despite Sarkozy saying he regarded Tibet as part of China and that there was no need to “dramatize” the encounter.

“The meeting went very well ... The Chinese authorities knew perfectly well this meeting would take place before the end of the year,” Sarkozy told reporters after the 30-minute talk.

China called off a summit with the EU last Monday in protest against Sarkozy’s plan to meet the Dalai Lama, branded by Beijing as a “splittist” for advocating self-determination for his mountain homeland.

On Saturday, China condemned the meeting.

“This development is indeed an unwise move which not only hurts the feelings of the Chinese people, but also undermines Sino-French ties,” the Xinhua news agency said in a commentary. “The French side ... took an opportunistic, rash and short-sighted approach to handling the Tibet issue.”

Sarkozy said the Dalai Lama, who welcomed him by draping a kata or traditional Tibetan white scarf on his shoulder, had said at the meeting that he does not seek independence for Tibet.

“I told him how much importance I attach to the pursuit of dialogue between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese authorities,” he said.

The two met in the Polish port of Gdansk where they joined 25th anniversary celebrations of Polish pro-democracy leader Lech Walesa’s winning the Nobel Peace Prize.

Playing down any possible negative impact on Sino-French ties, Sarkozy said: “There is no need to dramatize things.”

Beijing’s vocal criticism of Sarkozy’s plan to meet the Dalai Lama is linked to the fact that Paris holds the EU’s rotating presidency, diplomats say.

In Paris, an official said there had been no sign yet of any Chinese boycott of French products. The EU is China’s biggest trade partner and supermarket chain Carrefour employs tens of thousands of people in China.

Sarkozy said he was “free” to talk to whoever he wants.

“I am free as the French president and the EU president, I have values and convictions. Let’s not make things tense, the world doesn’t need it and it doesn’t correspond to reality,” he said.

Also See: French leader fails to break deadlock on EU climate pact                                                                                                                                                                                                           Also See: EDITORIAL: Setting a poor precedent                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      This story has been viewed 453 times.

Lessons from the 921 Earthquake

By Yang Yung-nane 楊永年

 Tuesday, May 20, 2008,  Page 8
                                                      

‘In China’s case, detailed information and channels of communication can be more important than material resources.’

The death toll from the Sichuan earthquake is in the tens of thousands and climbing. A reasonable assumption is that as communications and access in the disaster zone improve, the number will grow still higher. Experience shows that disaster data and the type of disaster are factors determining the effectiveness of relief. Such was the case after Taiwan’s 921 Earthquake.

The same is true with Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar, where poor communications and deliberate blocks on information by the government have hindered international relief efforts.

To maximize rescue options in the crucial first 72 hours after an event, hard information must be available.

Otherwise, even abundant supplies would be of no avail, as rescuers would have no leverage and may inadvertently waste resources.

Alternatively, rescue groups can first be sent to a disaster zone to hunt for victims, but the greater uncertainty in doing this might limit its success.

In China’s case, detailed information and channels of communication can be more important than material resources.

There are several reasons for a lack of disaster information. External communication may be cut off and roads blocked in disaster areas.

Exact figures on casualties may therefore not be available to either the government or private relief organizations. Even Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao’s (溫家寶) relief team could not get beyond Dujiangyan on their way to Wenchuan, and so were unable to reach the most seriously affected areas. In addition, media reports have said that there has been no contact with nearly 60,000 people near the epicenter, indicating that much information remains unavailable.

;  Added to this, the Chinese government and media’s grasp of the situation is fragmented.

The Chinese government also has strict control of the media and other communications. It would therefore be logical to assume that communication networks are not well developed.

China has relaxed certain media controls, but the regulations there are still much stricter than in Taiwan. This is not likely to change in the short term.

With the 921 Earthquake, large parts of Nantou and Taichung counties were completely cut off. Luckily, amateur radio enthusiasts were able to piece together valuable information for relief agencies so that rescue teams were able to arrive in the disaster areas earlier.

However, their capabilities were limited, and many of these places were unable to state what they needed before relief arrived.

When the Central Weather Bureau said the epicenter of the quake was in Chichi Township (集集) in Nantou County, many assumed that the situation there would be the most severe.

Later, Puli Township (埔里) in Nantou also reported severe damage, and the media then focused on those areas, leading the public and officials to focus their attention on them.

When Chungliao (中寮) and Kuohsing (國姓) townships reported damage of similar severity, a lack of communication channels and transportation delayed the influx of aid.

On the whole, the media focused on Nantou, which quickly received large amounts of aid from the public and the government.

The Nantou County commissioner called for drinking water, instant noodles, tents and other necessities over the radio, and in just three days, the local school gymnasium, acting as an emergency response center, was overflowing with donations.

Later, the mayor said that they had enough relief and that cash donations were required, and donations quickly arrived from various sources.

Taiwan’s intense media competition turns large-scale disasters into matters of great concern for everyone.

Although relief to certain disaster areas was delayed because they did not receive media attention, media reports can nonetheless work against delays in relief delivery.

More importantly, the media force the government to respond with more gravity to a disaster, thus giving the public an extra layer of security.

The Chinese government should respond to the disaster in Sichuan and surrounding areas by focusing on the collection and dissemination of information in order to maximize the effectiveness of relief work.
                                       

Yang Yung-nane is a professor in the Department of Political Science and vice dean of the College of Social Sciences at Cheng Kung University.
Translated by Angela Hong
                                        
This story has been viewed 1300 times.

*Ni rang wo zheng zai zhe li, 3 ge xiao shi (you) er she fen zhong. (...) Ni rang wo sheng qi...:

你讓我正在這裡三個小時二十分鐘 (...)

都還在家裡(...) 看者電視,吹者冷氣 (...) 那讓我生氣

•EDITORIAL: Goodbye, President Chen

Tuesday, May 20, 2008,  Page 8

“As you know, the president must carry out his responsibilities to the best of his abilities and conscience, but it must be done with taste and skill, otherwise one might become an object of ridicule, or provoke general hostility, and rightly so. I don’t claim that I always got it right. To the extent that I didn’t, it was clearly my own fault.”

While these words could be the musings of President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) as he sees out his last hours in office this morning, they were actually written by another leader, former Czech president Vaclav Havel, days before the end of his presidency in 2003. Chen and Havel had a few things in common. Both were part of grassroots movements opposing repressive rule — Chen in the dangwai and Havel in Charter 77 — and as a result spent time in jail.

Beyond the formative experiences of imprisonment for political views, however, Chen and Havel will both be remembered as controversial figures who led their countries amid churning political forces.

Part of the controversy that surrounds them, or the hatred directed at them, was the complex nature of what they were trying to do, efforts that pulled at the very identity of the people they governed.

In Havel’s case, the task involved dealing with the past — how to treat the previous authoritarian rulers and cut ties with the Soviet Union — and the future, by creating a Czech identity while joining organizations such as the EU and NATO.

Chen also sought to whittle away at his nation’s repressive past and remove symbols and names that, in many ways, still shackled its people. Looking to the future, he sought to create a better-defined, independent space for Taiwan on the international stage by attempting to join organizations like the UN and the WHO, among other global bodies.

For Chen and Havel, these endeavors proved divisive, made them objects of ridicule and provoked general hostility, but they carried out their duties to the best of their abilities and conscience.

Havel could have been referring to Chen when he wrote that everything had to be done with taste and skill, for on too many occasions Chen failed at both — alienating even his own supporters — and his extemporary speeches tended to make things worse.

In his last few years in office, Chen was also haunted by allegations of corruption, which, true or not, injured his image and ability to do his job.

Despite all this, as the last hours of his presidency lapse, there are few with sound judgment who could stand up and accuse Chen of not having cared for his country. From jail time to a 1985 assassination attempt on his wife, Wu Shu-jen (吳淑珍), as a warning against continuing down his path, Chen never allowed fears for his safety or image to undermine his vision for a free and independent Taiwan.

There is no question that this goal was divisive and generated hostility, that it heightened tensions in the Taiwan Strait, and that it made him the object of ridicule at home and abroad. But if we were to go back to the beginning and try to remember why Taiwanese accidentally put him in power in 2000, and then with a majority in 2004, we would see that he stuck to his bigger-picture mandate, often going it alone, perhaps quixotically, against a legislative and geopolitical environment that was stacked against him.

The balance of Chen’s achievements is hard to determine at this time; even in his party there are few who would be his cheerleader. However, with hardliners in the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government about to discover that the romantic era of strongman politics is over and that Taiwanese can no longer be dictated to, the positive side of Chen’s legacy might yet become more apparent.

        This story has been viewed 2235 times.  

•French leader fails to break deadlock on EU climate pact

            

    AGENCIES ,  GDANSK AND POZNAN, POLAND        
    Monday, Dec 08, 2008,  Page 6

French President Nicolas Sarkozy failed to end deadlock with ex-communist EU states on a climate package on Saturday but predicted a deal would be reached by a summit on Thursday and Friday.

“Things are moving in a good way ... I am convinced we will arrive at a positive conclusion,” Sarkozy, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said after meeting Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and eight other east European leaders.

Poland, which relies on high-polluting coal for more than 90 percent of its electricity, has threatened to veto an EU plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 unless Warsaw wins fossil fuel concessions.

                                                    

MORE TIME

“There is still a lot of work ahead of us” before the summit, Tusk said after the talks in the Polish port of Gdansk.

Poland argues it needs until 2020 to curb carbon emissions, for example by using more efficient boilers and carbon-scrubbing equipment and possibly building its first nuclear plant.

Tusk said Sarkozy and the EU Commission agreed to extend a period limiting mandatory purchases of emissions permits for east European coal plants, in an offer that would need the backing of all EU leaders.

                                                                                                            Tusk hinted at a willingness to compromise at the summit.

“At the very end, maybe at the very last minute, we may decide this is a solution we may accept,” Tusk said.

Poorer east European states say tough caps on carbon emissions will harm their economies at a time of global financial crisis, preventing them from catching up with wealthy western Europe.

Sarkozy saw reasons for optimism after the meeting leaders of Bulgaria, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Poland, Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia.

“It’s a very strong political signal that despite the financial crisis no state wanted to change the deadline or the objectives” of cutting emissions by a fifth, he said.

                                                                                                            

FORESTS

Meanwhile, hopes to reach agreement at another UN climate conference in Poznan, Poland, on protecting the world’s forests were fading.

The conference of nearly 190 countries was working on a plan to compensate countries to stop logging and converting forests to farmland, actions that were clearing 13 million hectares of forests a year up to 2005.

Negotiators had hoped a deal on forests would be one of the few concrete achievements of the two-week conference, which is preparing a global warming treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol that expires in 2012. The new pact is due to be complete next December.

                                                                                                            However, environmentalists said the talks were deadlocked in a committee.

Nine environmental groups submitted a statement to delegates urging them to wrap up the technical issues of an accord before the talks end on Friday, saying most of the hard work was done three months ago at the last negotiating session in Ghana.

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    China lashes out at Sarkozy over Dalai Lama meet

    BEIJING -- China protested strongly to France on Sunday over President Nicolas Sarkozy's meeting with the Dalai Lama, calling it a "rude intervention" into Chinese affairs.



    Sarkozy met the Tibetan spiritual leader on Saturday privately in Gdansk, Poland, during celebrations marking the 25th anniversary of former Polish President Lech Walesa's Nobel Peace Prize. The Dalai Lama has also received the prize.

    Although China routinely lodges protests when world leaders meet with the Dalai Lama, Sunday's complaint -- reported by the official Xinhua News Agency -- comes as China hardens its line toward the Himalayan region.

    China's relations with the French have been especially testy over the issue of Tibet since April, when pro-Tibetan activists protested en masse in the streets of Paris as the Olympic flame passed through the city on its world tour. Some Chinese called for boycotts of French products afterward.

    Several times over the last week, China demanded Sarkozy cancel the meeting and called off a major China-EU summit earlier this month in protest. Sarkozy downplayed the furor, saying, "There's no need to dramatize things."

    But on Sunday, Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister He Yafei summoned the French ambassador to China, Herve Ladsous, "and lodged a strong protest," Xinhua said.

    It quoted He Yafei as saying the meeting "grossly interfered in China's internal affairs."

    "It also severely undermined China's core interest, gravely hurt the feelings of the Chinese people and sabotaged the political basis of China-France and China-EU relations," He said.

    Officials in Sarkozy's office and France's Foreign Ministry would not immediately comment on the protest, while the spokeswoman of the French Embassy could not be reached late Sunday.

    Chinese state television quoted He as saying France now must "correct its mistake with actual deeds to enable China France relations to continue to be healthy and stable and advance forward."

    "This wrong act by France is a rude intervention in Chinese internal affairs and has hurt the feelings of Chinese people gravely," it quoted him as saying.

    "Sarkozy gave no consideration to numerous Chinese citizens' intense opposition" by seeing the Dalai Lama, He said, calling the exiled Tibetan leader a separatist and "political hooligan."

    Sarkozy stressed his talk with the Dalai Lama posed no threat to Beijing. "I told him how much importance I attach to the pursuit of dialogue between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese leadership," Sarkozy said. "The Dalai Lama confirmed what I already knew, that he is not demanding independence."

    After a weeklong meeting called in November to discuss a so-far failed policy of rapprochement with China after 50 years in exile, the Dalai Lama and other exiled leaders said they would maintain their push for genuine autonomy.

    China says Tibet has been part of its territory for more than seven centuries and denounces the Dalai Lama as a separatist who seeks to end Chinese rule of the Himalayan region. Many Tibetans say they were effectively an independent country for most of that time.

    The Dalai Lama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. He has lived in exile in Dharmsala, India, since fleeing Tibet amid an abortive uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. A self proclaimed Tibetan government-in-exile also is based in the northern Indian city.

    The Dalai Lama remains deeply revered among Tibetans, despite Beijing's relentless attempts to vilify him.

    http://www.chinapost.com.tw/international/europe/2008/12/08/186602/China%2Dlashes.htm

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    Sarkozy meets Dalai Lama as China fumes

    GDANSK, Poland -- French President Nicolas Sarkozy met the Dalai Lama Saturday at a gathering of Nobel Peace Prize laureates in the Polish city of Gdansk, shrugging off Chinese anger, an Elysee spokesman said.

    “One must approach this calmly,” Sarkozy said minutes prior to the meeting. “The world needs an open China that participates in global governance. China needs a powerful Europe that gives work to Chinese enterprise.”

    Sarkozy is the first European head of state to meet the Dalai Lama while holding the European Union’s rotating presidency.

    “I never hesitated. Every time I spoke about the subject I said I would meet the Dalai Lama before the end of 2008,” Sarkozy said.

    Earlier, Sarkozy arrived in Gdansk Saturday for a gathering of Nobel Peace Prize laureates during which he is to meet the Dalai Lama, a move that has China fuming.

    As current holder of the European Union’s six-month rotating presidency, the French leader’s decision to engage with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader has so far seen Beijing retaliate by scrapping a China-EU summit in France earlier this week. It also warned multi-billion-dollar trade deals between China and France were in jeopardy should the meeting go ahead.

    “We have not noticed any kind of start of a boycott of our products,” a French presidential official told AFP Saturday, emphasizing that France and China needed each other during a period of economic crisis.

    Asked Friday in the northern Polish city whether he thought the French president might cancel the meeting with him, as has happened twice in the past, the Dalai Lama said: “Wait until tomorrow. I don’t know.”

    Commenting on whether EU-China relations and trade could suffer over his planned meeting with Sarkozy the Dalai Lama remarked: “China also needs Europe.”

    “The original initiative of some pressure, sometimes is not followed by action,” he said.

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    http://www.chinapost.com.tw/china/local-news/tibet/2008/12/07/186515/Sarkozy%2Dmeets.htm

     

     

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